From Small Beginnings
by Xi-feng
Summary: A series of short pieces following Juubei, Toshiki and Kadsuki through the course of their early lives.
1. I It begins

It begins…

[Juubei]

Sakura puts her palm flat on the door as her father goes to open it, tipping her head back to meet his surprised gaze. "Let's not," she says, then more forcefully, "let's go home, daddy."

Trying his best to suppress an amused chuckle, Kakei Mamoru squats down beside his daughter, looking her in the eyes as he speaks. "Don't you want to see your mother, Sakura? And I hear that there's someone who's very eager to see _you._" Sakura's only response is to blow a very loud, unladylike raspberry and bury her face in her father's neck as he picks her up. No, she's changed her mind, she wanted a baby _sister_, not a brother, and now she's decided she doesn't want either. _She's_ the baby of the family, and now here comes someone else to steal her parents' attention and their love away from her. She just knows he's going to be horrible and smelly and noisy, and she isn't going to like him, she _won't _like him, and she and her father and mother should just go home together now, just the three of them, forget about the baby and--

All unknowing of her thoughts, her father swings open the heavy door with its good solid creak and steps through. He sets her down again and crosses the distance to the bed with smooth strides, placing a proud hand on his wife's shoulder with a smile, then glancing back to see what the little girl will do.

As for Sakura herself, she remains standing where she is, shrinking back against the door slightly as if to melt through it and escape into the brilliant August sunshine outside. Then her mother calls her name softly and she looks up, the dam breaks and she runs to the bed, practically flinging herself on the woman sitting there, who hugs her back with her free arm. Sakura steadfastly ignores the small bundle held gently in the other.

A sleepy sound from said bundle causes her mother to relax the hug slightly, her hand moving to smooth back satin locks from Sakura's face. "Sakura-chan, look who this is," she says, directing her daughter's attention where it really doesn't want to go. "Hello oneechan, my name is Juubei." She uses the tips of her fingers to move the baby's head in an approximation of a bow. "Yoroshiku ne."

As Sakura watches, the movement causes the baby to wake up from his half-doze and he makes some snuffly whimpering noises before deciding not to cry and opens his eyes instead. He seems to be looking directly at her, and she whispers, too fascinated to remember her previous resentment, "look, mother… he's got such blue eyes."

"See how small he is?" her mother asks gently. "He's going to need someone to look out for him, to teach him about the world." The baby slowly blinks in agreement, his fuzzy unfocused gaze not shifting from his sister who in turn watches him, captivated by his quiet presence.

Hesitantly she raises her hand and waves to him, and the little face snuggled amongst the fluffy blankets is suddenly lost in a huge toothless yawn. Sakura giggles, and that gives her the confidence to slowly stretch out her hand and place it on his head, surprised at how warm he is. No, maybe he isn't so bad after all.

"…Hello, little Juubei," she says, as her parents' eyes meet above her head and they exchange fond smiles, "don't worry, I'm going to take good care of you."

No, he's not so bad.

[Toshiki]

Yuko holds the sleeping baby loosely in her arms as she glares through the grime on the window glass and out onto the filthy grey city stretching as far as the eye can see: gloomy, oppressive. A thin poisonous-looking sleet spatters against the panes and lashes the ugly buildings around the shelter. It matches her mood quite well. In the distance thunder grumbles around the corners of the sky, then is quiet again. Even the heavens don't think Tokyo is worth the effort to get together a really good storm and blast it off the face of the earth.

Pity.

Forgotten in her lap, the unnamed baby shifts slightly in his sleep, then settles down again.

Yuko continues to stare at the city – pouring her rage and despair into Tokyo is probably better than focusing it at the only other target to hand…

_Oh hell, he's blonde. _That isn't the sort of thing most mothers think on their first sight of their child, but compared to that, the question of how many fingers and toes he might have and all the rest of that crap had been secondary considerations. Trust the kid to not even _look_ Japanese.

Oh, she knows all the names they have for girls that hang round the foreign soldiers when they come into the city; a fair amount of them have stuck to her, and a fair amount she's picked up and slung right back at her tormentors. It's not like she gives a damn, anyway. 

But now what? She can't go home to her parents with a little half-_gaijin_ kid… if he'd had the decency to look even slightly Japanese she could have given it a shot, but not now. Not like this. She remembers the last time she'd spoken to Luke, just over six months before: making extra effort in her pronunciation over the crackly reception of the phone, she'd gathered up her courage and told him. There had been a long pause, and he'd said something she hadn't understood. The line had gone dead.

After that, he hadn't answered his phone. She'd called him every day, written him letter after letter in her careful English handwriting. Eventually she'd gotten up the courage, hitchhiked to the air base at Yokota, been stopped at the gates. Oh, didn't she know? The lieutenant had been transferred home just last week, sorry, no, she couldn't have his home address, that was classified, goodbye.

_That cheap prick, _she thinks, unconsciously tightening her grasp on the boy until her nails dig deep into his delicate skin and he wakes and starts wailing as loud as his unpractised lungs will let him, hands bunching into fists by his face.

Alerted by sounds that are definitely not the cries of a hungry or tired baby, one of the shelter workers appears in the half-open doorway and stands against the frame, watching disapprovingly. This one is less than 24 hours old and she's already seen his mother drop him on the floor twice, once directly on his head, and now this. _Some people really don't deserve to have children_, she thinks, looking squarely at the livid red crescents the mother's nails have left on her baby's skin as his screaming goes up another notch while Yuko gives an exasperated groan and clumsily tries to get him to shut up. The worker refrains from taking the woman by the shoulders and giving her a good shake, settling for scooping up the baby and calming him herself, sighing. Sometimes Christian duty can be a hard thing to do.

[Kadsuki]

"He really shouldn't be sleeping right now." Tsukihiko inclines his head fractionally towards his wife, trying to whisper without moving his lips. It's harder than it looks.

"What do you expect?" Karin murmurs back, "babies will be babies… I'll wake him if you like, but he'll be perfectly justified in crying if I do." She leans closer for a moment, not having the use of her arms; close enough so they can feel one another's warmth through the layered kimono they both wear. "It's not as if he's missing much, anyway."

"No, just his introduction to the world." Tradition is heavy here; its weight can be felt in the timbers of the manor, in the way the light falls through the half-open paper screens, in the way the echoes of far-off rooms sneak up on unsuspecting ears. It's a particular taste the air has, not dust or staleness of any kind, just the feel of long years piled up in the corners of rooms and flung over furniture as though waiting for a maid to pick them up and shake them out. Five centuries' worth of Fuuchouin feet have walked the long dark hallways, darted from sun-speckled patch to sun-speckled patch on the terraces, danced barefoot to the sounds of koto and shamisen in the gardens. If you could see this web of tradition floating through the estate, it would be golden, nebulous, throwing out its silken threads to glitter in the newly reborn sun. Yes, the year has come around again, old to new, and this time, as so many before, it has brought a shining new strand to be woven into the tapestry of the Fuuchouin line.

It is upon this new addition that the weight of tradition settles today, wrapping around him as snugly as the embroidered peach-coloured kimono – far too grand and expensive for such a small baby, really – that he has been dressed in for the ceremony: the ceremony to which he is happily oblivious as he sleeps in his mother's arms.

At the head of the long chamber the current head of the clan, the baby's grandfather, reads aloud from one of the two great chronicles of Japanese history, recounting the victories and losses of old, the loyalty, bravery and honour that have come down from those times, the tales of this nation surrounded by water that is the baby's heritage and contains all the lessons he needs to learn. Some family members play soft chords on koto, or ring small bronze bells at predetermined points in the narrative; others feed the small incense burners scattered around the room, and the scents of exotic Chinese spices blend and dance in the air.

Finally the recitation comes to an end, and the baby's parents bring him down the long aisle between the offerings of flowers and rice cakes that have been given as prayer for the child's learning and his health. Together, they kneel before the old man, and Karin bows her head and presents her son.

The Fuuchouin chief takes the small boy in his arms, raising an eyebrow to see his grandson's slumbering face, then fixes his bright eyes upon Tsukihiko. There is an unspoken communication between father and son, Tsukihiko colouring slightly, embarrassed; the old man looking very much as though he would like to shake his head in amused exasperation if not for the formality of the occasion. Addressing the baby as if he were awake, he continues reciting the blessings that have been pronounced at the naming of each Fuuchouin child for as long as the clan has existed, split off from the Imperial line some five hundred years before in the declining years of the Muromachi age.

"As the bells of Gion ring out the impermanence of all things; as the river's current, never ceasing, shall never bring around the same water again, the world shows us its fleeting nature from one moment to the next. The blossoms scatter from the cherry trees, the moon dies and is reborn, the old wither and their descendents spring up like new shoots in spring.

'The threads in the weave needs must change, yet the pattern remains constant. Thus does the line continue, from age to age, from generation to generation, bound together through the ties of honour, of loyalty, as the children look back to the lessons of their ancestors and learn what they may. 

'Then, Fuuchouin-no-Kadsuki, son and heir of this proud Fuuchouin clan, this is the duty with which thy ancestors charge thee.

'Protect thy home, protect thy kin, protect thy allies; these things above all else.

'Stay true to the blood that runs in thy veins, uphold the ideals of thy clan, never forget the nobility inherent in thy name.

'For without these things we are as leaves in the wind; a Fuuchouin who does not heed this is swept away like a passing dream on a night in spring. The flower withers and falls, the winter comes, the moon is eclipsed by the darkness.

'For all else in this world of illusion is dust."


	2. II Age 4 & 3: First steps

Kadsuki's one year younger than Juubei (and Tosh, I'm guessing) – thus the different ages.

First steps

Age 4/3

[Juubei]

The summer has come round again. The great wheel of the seasons has made another revolution, and now is the time of the long hot days when the sun scorches the skin and the evenings where it is too sticky to sleep comfortably on a futon, so the nights are spent in wide-eyed staring into darkness, listening to the interminable sound of cricket orchestras and the whine of biting insects outside the mosquito net, nights full of contemplation as to whether autumn will ever come, longing for the slightest breath of cool air and the bright colours of the trees as they shed their leaves in a final blaze of glory for the ending of the year.

But now summer is coming to an end. 

The Kakei house is located on the fringes of the Fuuchouin estate: a small allotment of land and a comfortable home with easy access to the main facility for the doctors of the aristocratic line. It is a small house and old, old as the bond between needle and thread, but it serves its purpose quite adequately, and Kakei Aya thinks, as she sits fanning herself under the overhanging eaves of the low roof and listening to the sound of the children playing somewhere nearby, that she would much rather be here than in the awesome elegance of the compound, where every stick of furniture is a priceless antique and off-limits to small fingers, where _We Do Not Run In The Hallways, Kadsuki_ and days are spent in a formal silence and strict exercise of etiquette. She has met the little Fuuchouin heir on a number of occasions, and is always struck by the innumerable constraints his family place upon him, even at such a young age where he cannot possibly hope to understand what is expected of him. If she hadn't seen the sternness of that family, she might have been tempted to consider herself and Mamoru as overly strict parents.

Two extremely loud and excited voices gradually get even louder as the children come into sight around the corner of the house. Sakura has a delicately embroidered ball, a traditional Geisha's toy all in white thread and blue and orange stars, and is tossing it up and down in the air. Juubei runs around her, waving his arms to try and catch it, but the girl makes use of her superior height and lifts it up out of his reach whenever he gets close.

"'Neechan, 'neechan! I want to play---"

"Sing for me, little Juubei," Sakura laughs, enjoying teasing him far too much. "Sing and I'll let you play."

Juubei, of course, needs no second bidding. Singing is one of the things he does best, after all. As Sakura begins gently tossing the ball to him (with a few fumbles on his part, but he _is _becoming more co-ordinated) and catching it when he throws it back with as much strength as he can, he starts in on his favourite song, aiming for volume rather than tune – in fact, when he hits the right notes it's usually a matter of accident rather than intention.

"Little elephant, little elephant,  
You have a long long nose.  
Yes sir, my mother has a long nose, too.  
  
Little elephant, little elephant,  
Who do you like best in the world?  
Well, I like my mother best in the world."

Sakura catches the ball and instead of throwing it back lifts it above her head, standing on her tiptoes to increase her height. "Wait… _who_ do you like best in the world?"

Juubei jumps up and down impatiently, quickly modifying the last line.

"Well, I like my Sakura-neechan best in the world."

Aya can't help chuckling as her daughter continues the game with a vindicated expression on her face and Juubei joins in, his enthusiastic too-loud-for-polite-company laughter echoing around the Kakei homestead, and it is not without a touch of regret that she calls for them both to come in out of the open before they get sunstroke.

[Toshiki]

Toshiki doesn't know why he's been given this stupid, completely time-wasting duty. That old geezer hates him, that's the only explanation for why he's out here _again, _getting in trouble _again, _and everyone else has gone down to the waterfall to view the momijitrees' flame-red colouring and he's stuck sweeping the temple grounds _again. _

Autumn comes round, and Toshiki sweeps the grounds.

It's not even as if he hit the other boy all that hard.

It really is a time-wasting task, especially when one goes about it the way Toshiki does. He concentrates just long enough to sweep up all the dead leaves in a quarter of the courtyard into a big pile, red and honey-yellow and interesting orange ones that look as if someone has nibbled all the way around the edges with funny-shaped teeth… and that's what gets him every time. He gets distracted examining the different sorts and colours of leaves he's raked into the heap, or something interesting leaps into the forefront of his mind and he can be absorbed for a good ten minutes turning it over and over, examining all its facets and flaws, the way it catches the light when he looks closely and following its implications as far as he can.

Then he looks around him and sees that all his work has been destroyed by a few malicious gusts of wind that have strewn the autumn rags all over the courtyard again. No wonder, he thinks, that the wind god Susanowo is always the troublemaker in the stories. He certainly makes enough trouble for Toshiki.

It's not even as if the other boy didn't deserve it.

_If everyone else wants to view momiji leaves_, he thinks, _why don't they just stay and help me? There's probably more of the rotten things here than on the trees now anyway. _He aims a particularly vicious kick at a small cluster of leaves by his feet, so close they almost look as though they're mocking him. One flies up and lands in his hair, and he grabs at it, tugging out a few golden strands in the process.

The shabby acolyte's clothes he wears don't really do much to block out the cutting breeze that knifes across the grounds time and time again. It really is getting close to winter – the wind has lost that refreshing touch that is so welcome in the summer heat, and when it blows from the direction of the mountains there's a taste of snow, a promise of snow, that wasn't there yesterday or the day before.

Snow will be welcome, if only so he won't have to sweep the damned leaves from the courtyard anymore. But of course, he'll probably get into trouble over something else and be made to shovelthesnow from the square _instead_.

On impulse he spins round and sticks out his tongue at the elegant figure of the temple pagoda rising into deepening twilight sky, but spotting the monk watching him from under its eaves he quickly swallows it with an audible _gulp _and turns back to furiously attacking the leaves with his broom, sending them up in swirls and flurries that settle back in as much disorder as before.

The late afternoon shadows lengthen, sending the shadow of the pagoda creeping further and further across the courtyard, cutting out the feeble warmth of the sun wherever it touches. The autumn wind gusts gently again, and a fresh scattering of leaves are sent floating gracefully down onto the wide stones of the square.

Toshiki's going to be here for some time.

[Kadsuki] 

Fuuchouin Kadsuki, three years old, direct and only heir of the long and noble line descended from emperors, is playing his favourite game.

He sits in a perfectly formal _seiza _position, long accustomed to the ache in his ankles with his hands apart to the width of his chest, a long koto string that has been tied to make a circle looped into a noose around his index, middle, ring and little fingers so it goes around the back of his hands and between thumb and forefinger.

His mother sits opposite him across the low _kotatsu _table, its warmth welcome in the draughty rooms of the manor that do little to block out the chill of this most recent January snowfall. They both wear heavy winter kimono, but Karin finds herself grateful for the small battery-operated heater installed under the table's blankets. She will have to try again to persuade Tsukihiko to get electricity installed in the house – untraditional or not, it's not good for the boy to be so cold all the time. She watches him finish adjusting the string around his fingers and asks, "well? Ready to begin?"

Kadsuki nods, and she reaches over and makes the first move, pulling the crossed strings away from the centre of the figure, then threading her own slender fingers through the taut lines and lifting them up, slipping the string from Kadsuki's hands to her own. "The Mountain Cat," she says, regarding the shape they've made.

Now it's Kadsuki's turn. He slides his fingers down into the nooses around his mother's thumbs and little fingers, pulling them out to the sides and moving his thumb and forefingers under to pull the strings straight again. "That's… chopsticks," he says, a small frown on his face as he concentrates.

They carry on in this vein for some time. All the favourite shapes are revisited, more are invented, forgotten forms rediscovered, and sometimes one or the other makes a mistake and the string slips from unwary fingers, collapses into a lifeless circle on the tabletop between them. It's a shape with limitless potential, but only with a master weaver to give it strength and breathe life into its forms. Kadsuki is feeling his way yet, learning without knowing what it is he does, integrating the feel and the movement of the strings into his very bones as he plays this ancient child's game with his mother for simple enjoyment's sake. He might not remember this when he grows older, but these games are his introduction to the threads that will form the core structure of his art, his discipline, and the lessons learned now are the most invaluable of all.

Now Kadsuki is attempting the tricky business of forming the Horse's eye, trying to push a particularly stubborn loop over one finger with the tip of another while attempting to straighten out a tangle he's gotten himself into with the nooses on the other hand. He's distracted and doesn't notice when the string twitches slightly and slips over his clumsy digit all by itself, but Karin does, and she smiles knowingly and with more than a little pride, and Kadsuki sees and laughs back, expressive eyes shining with delight.

* * *

_The song Juubei sings is an actual Japanese children's rhyme. It's very cute ^_^_


	3. III Age 6 & 5: First lessons

First lessons

Age 6/5

[Juubei]

The milky light sneaking in through the cracks in the paper screen is _that_ kind of light; the illumination of a clear spring morning where the cherry trees shake themselves, stretch out their slender branches to the promise of warmth in the eastern sky, and feeling the little birds that have been missing all winter hopping along their boughs realise _'oh look, springtime has come around again.'_ It's the kind of morning where you might well spot the first blossoms breaking free from their buds on those same trees, or perhaps a small deer running easily across the landscape surrounding the Fuuchouin manor, or maybe even the shy _kami_ spirit Sakura swears she has seen in the woods around the cottage, and there are a hundred and one things for a small boy to be getting himself into on a day like today.

Juubei just can't stand to stay in bed a moment longer.

He pushes the soft covers away enough that he can slide out from the warm space between his parents – his father mumbles something and shifts slightly in his sleep, and Juubei freezes until he is sure it's safe, stepping with exaggerated caution over his mother and tiptoeing along the edges of the room, one hand on the wall to steady himself, until he reaches the door. He slides it open just enough to squeeze through and closes it again, wincing a little at the familiar creak that seems to be asking him exactly what he's doing up at this hour, but once on the other side he feels more confident and giggles a little at his own daring.

Daring he may be, this half-sized samurai, but some missions can't be carried out without a little assistance. Juubei turns and pads on quiet feet towards the next door along the narrow corridor, avoiding the telltale creak that hides under the loose floorboard three paces from his parents' room, and pulls open the door that has 'Sakura' stencilled in elegant calligraphy on a small hanging sign.

Like any normal person over the age of six, Kakei Sakura is still asleep at this hour, bundled up in deep pink sheets; a mere suggestion of a sleeping girl curled demurely on her futon. Juubei doesn't stand on ceremony, entering quickly and dropping to his knees beside the top of her head that is all that is visible under the heavy material.

"Hey, 'neechan," he whispers. "'Neechan, wake _up…_"

When that doesn't work he resorts to tugging at her hair with increasing force, at the same time chanting "'neechan, 'neechan, 'neechan," in steadily louder and more insistent tones until Sakura pulls away and swats at him with a sleep-clumsy hand.

"Juu_bei!_"

"Come on come on, you have to get up now! I need you to help me."

The covers pull back just far enough to reveal one cranky eye the colour of not-yet-6am on a chilly pastel morning. A sigh. "…What now?"

That's all the opening Juubei needs. "I'm hunting the _kami_ today, so I need you to come along and tell me when we see him, okay? Otherwise how will I know if it's really him?"

Despite the time, there's a hint of a grin in Sakura's voice as she answers. Juubei still hasn't grown out of that gullible phase, and oh it's wrong but she has _such _fun teasing him. "I think you'll know when you see him, Juubei-kun. Remember what I told you? He's a tiny girly little thing, littler than you, even, with long brown hair and a pink kimono. But I don't think you'll have much luck at this time: I don't think _kami_ get up much before eight o'clock on weekends. Are you still going to stuff him in a sack and carry him home when you catch him?"

Juubei prickles at the 'littler than you, even' comment, but his good mood survives intact, and with it his boundless energy that refuses to go back to bed and wait for the _kami_ to get up so he can be kidnapped. There's only one thing left to do in a situation like this so he does it, pouncing on Sakura and attempting to wriggle under the blankets. If he aggravates her enough,  'neechan won't be able to go back to sleep and maybe she'll play with him.

He has, however, neglected to take into account the minor detail that he's bothering Sakura, who is currently wrapped in a mass of sheets. Faced with an annoying little sibling intruding into her element, Sakura makes a grab at the nearest bundle of soft pink fabric and--

"Kakei Fui Ryuu!"

Like the spreading wings of a peacock, the material under her fingers comes to life, unfolding and rearing up around the small boy before coiling snakelike around his wriggling form and hiding it from view. Just to drive home her victory, Sakura makes sure to sit quite firmly atop the squirming brother-shaped bundle and try to render him immoveable.

For his part Juubei eventually manages to free an arm and a leg from the tangled sheets, though they're still wrapped firmly around his head and the rest of his body. He makes a brave effort to free himself, but the fact that he's squealing and giggling helplessly probably doesn't help his cause.

Juubei fights and Sakura chuckles, and all notions of time are lost. Juubei frees another leg and Sakura traps his arm again and adds another sheet to the bindings, and their laughter breaks out of the room to run heedless through the cottage. Juubei waves a foot blindly in his sister's direction and Sakura catches hold and tickles him mercilessly, and both turn around with honest surprise when their parents burst into the room to demand an explanation of what they think they're doing up at this hour.

Juubei won't see the _kami _this year.

[Toshiki]

There's a phoenix sitting on the windowsill.

…Okay, Toshiki might have to admit that most phoenixes are slightly more nobly golden and fiery and slightly less pigeon-shaped, but it _could_ be a phoenix. There's no law against phoenixes being in disguise, as far as he knows, and as disguises go it's a pretty convincing one. He leans his chin on a hand and regards it seriously. The phoenix trains its beady little eyes on him and stares right back.

"Uryuu! Are you paying attention to your text, or are you looking out of the window?"

Toshiki jumps slightly and his attention snaps back to the familiar tedium of the temple schoolroom, slightly dismayed to find himself still here, only five minutes into the future since he was here last. Aware of the concentrated stares of seventeen other acolytes and the megawatt glare of Brother Shun beside the chalk dust coated blackboard, he nonchalantly moves his gaze down to the thick book in front of him. The paper is creased and yellowing, the binding beginning to crumble away beneath his non-too-careful handling: it must have been printed sometime just after the Pacific War, but compared to its contents it is positively new, in pristine just-minted form. The temple needs to train its charges in the skills of reading and writing amongst other things, and the materials it chooses to do so reflect the ends to which they'll eventually be used.

Glancing sidelong at the boy sitting beside him, Toshiki turns as unobtrusively as possible to the correct page, and feels the familiar drop in his chest as his heart sinks to approximately the level of his stomach. Lin Chi Yi Sen again, great.

_'Friends, I tell you this: there is no Buddha, no spiritual path to follow, no training and no realization. What are you so feverishly running after? Putting a head on top of your own head, you blind idiots? Your head is right where it should be. The trouble lies in your not believing in yourselves enough. Because you don't believe in yourselves you are knocked here and there by all the conditions in which you find yourselves. Being enslaved and turned around by objective situations, you have no freedom whatsoever; you are not masters of yourselves...'_

Toshiki restrains the urge to roll his eyes. He hates this lesson most of all – the dull Buddhist texts, the incomprehensible kanji characters these old monks and philosophers like to use to show off their learning… who cares about this stuff, anyway? He's a fighter, is Toshiki: he focuses and practices and he improves and he never _ever_ gives up. That's why he's foremost amongst the boys his age at the temple dojo. But when he's called to stare at a textbook for long hours memorising kanji and absorbing weighty Buddhist ponderings his attention wanders and turns to phoenixes and dragons, _kami_ and demons, shining gemstones in a shallow riverbed or pale fruit hanging in the light of the moon. He's not an unintelligent boy, far from it, but his imagination is still growing at a faster rate than the rest of him and as a result his studies suffer and trail off into incomprehension and elaborately doodled question marks that crawl around the page like a colony of snails.

 Knowing that the threadbare monk at the head of the class is keeping a close eye on him, he continues to diligently follow the inky shapes that dance mockingly on the paper as one of the other acolytes reads them aloud in a voice that stutters and stumbles over itself every couple of syllables.

_'O you followers of Truth! Do not be deceived by others. Inwardly or outwardly, if you encounter any obstacles, kill them right away. If you meet the Buddha, kill him! Do not get yourself entangled with any object, but stand above, pass on and be free!'_

Toshiki isn't here by choice. The temple is his only home; these stones have surrounded him in their protective suffocation ever since he can remember. What does he want to do with his life? No small child can know the answer to that question, of course, but the one thing he _does _know is the thought that runs through his head like his very own mantra, confirming day and night _this is not for me, I don't want this, this is not for me._ Let his hateful 'brothers' here live out the rest of their lives inside these walls that shield them from the outside world, these boys who can't throw a punch to match him, who can't block one of his attacks no matter how they might taunt him with their words and their stares and their laughter. The world is very likely a horrible place, but Toshiki wants to see it. Toshiki needs to see it.

When he looks again, the phoenix is gone.

[Kadsuki]

_Children, _as he is often told, _are seen and not heard. _

Of course, it's not really fair that he hears so many lectures on what children _should be_ or _should do_, since he _is_ and _does_ all those things anyway. Being a perfectly well behaved and well-brought up heir to such a prominent family is frustratingly difficult at the best of times, but doesn't he try?

That's why he's sitting here quietly with a handful of illustrated poetry cards instead of running around outside in the fresh spring air under the first smattering of cherry blossoms that dot the estate. Though he usually keeps to his mother's suite of rooms, today is the last day this year that the hina dolls he received at his birth will be displayed on their red seven-tiered podium, and he has come to bid them a quiet farewell. He rather suspects his father is sitting by the window, book in hand, for the same reason.

Looking at Fuuchouin Tsukihiko, it is easy to see where his son's appearance stems from. Like all male members of the clan he is small, slim, almost waif-like and lost inside the deep winter kimono, which is elegant despite its heavy folds and lines, and his black hair would spill across his shoulders and down almost to the floor were it not bound back inside its long wrap. There is a quiet jingle of cat-bells as he turns to catch the boy's searching gaze, and he smiles and turns again to look out through the window at the ancient gardens that surround the manor.

Kadsuki is more interested in the dolls. On the lowest levels of the display are the contents of a miniature bridal trousseau: a tiny lacquered tea set, musical instruments, a palanquin and a large box with inlaid mother of pearl figures dancing upon its shiny black surface. He's had his fingers forcibly removed from these fascinating treasures so many times that he doesn't even attempt to play with them now. 

Above the sixth level, things _really_ start getting interesting. On the fifth level three court guards sit pompously to attention between potted peach blossoms, the handmade silken petals brushing the stuffy robes of the court officials on the shelf above. Moving higher and there are five seated figurines holding miniature instruments in their delicate little hands, their matching period-costumes evoking the mood of the long-ago Heian court, now brought so close to the present Kadsuki can almost see…but he's getting ahead of himself.

To see the final two levels he has to stand on tiptoe, balancing carefully with rather more grace than such a small child should really have. From this position he can make out the three ladies-in-waiting as they perch on their embroidered cushions with identical smug expressions. Kadsuki always thinks they look as though they're in the middle of sharing some particularly nasty gossip, and they're waiting for him to go away out of earshot before they continue. Finally he has to lean forward, bracing himself on the lowest shelf with his fingertips (and oh, wouldn't his mother throw a fit if she were to see him so close to the expensive breakables) For someone of his stature, it's the only way to see the highest two figures: the emperor and his empress, as they look down haughtily upon the lower stories and the boy peering up at them.

"Goodbye, goodbye," he whispers to the silent little puppets, "sleep well until next year."

On her high throne, the empress tilts her head and looks at him. Her glassy black eyes twinkle.

Kadsuki gasps, staggers back as she rises from her cushion and takes tiny delicate steps towards him. He spins around, opening his mouth to call for his father, then stops. Something about the way Tsukihiko is looking far too seriously out of that window…

He turns round again as the emperor jumps up as well and begins chasing the empress around the top level of the structure. Narrowing his eyes… yes, he can just make out the fine threads entwined around the dolls' limbs and crisscrossing through the air, and he stifles his giggles with his hands. Now all the courtiers and handmaidens join in the chase, as the empress turns the tables and pursues the emperor up and down the podium, the chase finally culminating with the other dolls stuffing him in the great black box and seating the empress on its lid to keep him in. 

The play apparently finished, he turns around to his father again, only to find Tsukihiko watching him with a mischievous grin on his face. He matches it, but his tone is stern as he admonishes, "if _I'm_ not allowed to play with the dolls, then I don't think mother would let you either." Glancing back at the display, he adds "she might put _you _in that box if you're not careful."

His father chuckles. "I'll take that risk." He detaches a small bell from the wraps restraining his hair, and holds it out. It gives out a sweet chime in the chill silence of the manor's eastern wing as Kadsuki receives it in his palm, closing small fingers around it and marvelling at its coolness, its perfect symmetry and the tone of the music that issues from his fist each time he moves it. Even when he stops moving the sounds continue as the threads spooled securely inside the tiny sphere hum with a familiar resonance to his presence. This is the first time he has held one of these bells, though they adorn the hair of many of his relatives. Before they have always been symbols of beauty and security, a comforting reminder that his family is nearby and always ready to protect and reassure him. Now, for the first time he recognises another reality. This tiny thing is a weapon – he can feel the energy coiled up tight inside it, an energy that has begun to respond to him. For the first time Kadsuki is aware of his own power, this thing inside him that calls to the threads, wants him to grow bigger and stronger so he can bend them to his will, and for the first time he becomes afraid.

For that reason he doesn't protest when Tsukihiko reclaims the bell and fastens it back in its accustomed place. Forgetting his lessons of etiquette and protocol he scrunches his eyes closed and buries his face into his father's kimono, denying the outside world and everything it wants of him. For the moment he just wants to stay here as he is right now: not a Fuuchouin, not a Threadspinner with a great future expected of him, just Kadsu-chan and nothing more.

Not understanding, Tsukihiko chuckles and shakes his head at his child's capricious behaviour, and with a porcelain-fine hand on his slender shoulders pulls him closer into the hug.

_* * *_

_Couldn't resist giving Toshiki that text to read – it seems to sum his character and his problems up so well. I love writing Kadsuki's parts, since there are so many fun traditional girls' traditions to weave into his family doings. I found some nice photographs of the conventional hina dolls at http://www.vill.nishiokoppe.hokkaido.jp/Office/AET/homepage61.jpg and http://members.tripod.com/asiatravelclub/images/mar99archives/Hinadoll.jpg _


	4. IV Age 8 & 7: What we're born to do

Thanks for the reviews, everyone ^___^ More 'Toshiki vs the world' angst again, and setbacks abound...

What we're born to do

Age 8/7

[Juubei]

Winter again.

This is the best place to be in the whole world, Juubei thinks, on a night like tonight. Let the wind blow! Let it batter itself against the sturdy walls and try to rattle the windows in their frames! Let the snow pile up, billows upon billows; paint the cool, slick surfaces with spidery whorls and etchings of frost… the whole world can turn to ice and stay that way for a thousand years, for all he cares. To lie curled up under the crisp warm blankets of the _kotatsu_ table, absorbed in the sounds of the elements outside and the slight scratchiness of the tatami mat under the bare arm upon which he rests his head: was there ever anything more wonderful than this? There's a mug of hot chocolate by his elbow and a thick and well-loved book by his nose… if he lifts his head from its relaxed loll he can turn the tatty page and be immersed once more in the old tales, where forty-seven loyal samurai have just lost their master and sworn on their honour to avenge him. 

But there's no need for that just yet. To know that the story is there if he wants it, just as the warm drink is there for him if he reaches out, that assurance is almost better than the things themselves. Fine just to lie here stretched out on his belly for a while, the racket of the blizzard outside and the heat inside wrapping round him like a snug blanket, everything is vibrant shades of sunburnt yellow and terracotta inside his head and he can barely muster up the effort to keep his eyes drifting closed.

However long later (it seems that keeping his eyes open was too great a bother after all) there's the sound of the heavy door opening and the resulting slight drop in temperature as the wind strolls in and makes itself at home before his mother, joining Sakura's voice in calling out the traditional homecoming, pushes against the door and shuts it outside again. Juubei doesn't respond, still feeling far too relaxed to sit up and re-enter the world just yet, though one deep blue eye cracks open as his mother enters and begins rummaging around in the cupboards across the other side of the room. Her hair, blown loose and wild, smells of snow and the dark night outside. 

"Be careful outside, Juubei," she says without turning from her inspection of the cupboard's contents. She takes out a tangle of grey wool almost unravelled from its ball and a pair of knitting needles. The needles are dull and blunt, and hold no interest for the boy. "The paths are already iced over, so don't forget and rush out tomorrow morning. Sakura already slipped once just now."

"…'Neechan?"

That's enough to rouse him from his three-quarters-doze and he slips out from under the blankets, stepping lightly over book and mug and out into the cool corridor. He yawns and pads to Sakura's door, tapping his fingers against the wood as he calls softly, "'Neechan? Are you okay?"

"Hmm? What is it?" Sakura's voice is slightly muffled, but she sounds cheerful enough from what Juubei can tell. He pushes the door open slightly but keeps his toes carefully on the dividing line between his sister's bedroom and the hallway.

"Did you fall down? Does it hurt?"

Sakura looks up from her reflection in the mirror, where she's trying to straighten out the tangles put in her hair by the whirls and eddies of the darkness outside, and can't help but smile. "I slipped on some ice out there. It's just this… it doesn't hurt, just stings a bit." She holds out a hand to show the scraped palm: slightly red and raw-looking, but hardly life-threatening. "And you can come in, if you want."

Now he's been invited, he steps over the threshold and takes her hand in both of his own, turning it this way and that to inspect the graze more closely. Already at this age his hands are skilled, wise: he turns Sakura's wrist with smooth and fluid movements, gentle fingers ghosting over the skin but only skirting the edge of the redness, careful above all else not to cause his sister any pain. "I can help this," he suddenly announces, snapping his head up with an excited glitter in his eyes. "Just wait here!"

"Really Juubei, there's no need--" But the boy has already disappeared out of the door, and Sakura shakes her head with a wry grin. So she's going to play guinea pig again, is she? Last time he swore he knew what he was doing and somehow managed to lock up the muscles in both her legs so tight that she hadn't been able to move from her seated position until their father came home and undid whatever-it-was Juubei had done wrong. Still, that was six months ago – _surely _he's improved since then?

In a minute he's back with the wrist guard he got for his birthday. Slipping out a slender needle from its sheath he reaches out and takes her wrist in a firm grasp, straightening her arm so the muscles and ligaments are fully extended, then bends over to study it closely, needle poised and cinnamon hair falling before his eyes. Sakura can't help but turning her face away slightly and tensely pursing her lips as she waits for it to go in: her father has treated her various injuries and illnesses, head- and stomach-aches in this way ever since she was born, but Juubei… well, she's still not altogether confident that he knows what he's doing. 

A dart of silver, and the needle is in and out before she can react to the slight prick. Almost at once the dull throb of the scraped skin disappears, and she has to feel a little guilty at doubting her brother's abilities. Now the pain has completely vanished, and aside from a slight tingly numbness in her palm, she feels as good as new. She flexes her fingers a few times as an experiment, and grins as she meets his eyes.

"Did I help it?"

"…Yes, yes you did." Sakura bunches her fingers another few times to try and dispel the lingering numbness, and reaches out with her other hand to ruffle his hair affectionately. "Thank you."

"Hey!" Juubei laughs as he pushes her away and pats down his long bangs again. "And you're welcome… it's what I was born to do, after all. Right?"

"Right." She rubs her hands together to try and bring some life back into the injured one and looks out of her window where, if it wasn't snowing so enthusiastically, could be seen the lights of the main compound against the backdrop of the encircling mountains. "I'm sure the Fuuchouin clan will be lucky to have you as their doctor, Juubei."

Her brother's eyes light up – that is about the best compliment he could ever have received. "Really? Do you really think so?" He jumps up, clutching the long needles to his chest. "Well, if you're sure you're okay… I'm going to practice some more with these."

Sakura's eyes follow him as he spins about and darts out of her room, and she follows his pounding footfalls down the corridor to their father's study. Alone once again, she allows herself a small chuckle at his enthusiasm, rubbing slightly more roughly at her lower arm, which has begun to tingle in its turn. But… wait… _okay_, _what's going on?_

She turns her attention fully onto the afflicted limb, completely anaesthetized below the wrist and rapidly advancing tendrils of numbness in the direction of her elbow and beyond, curling around her upper arm and digging into her shoulder. The hallway outside is suspiciously quiet, and there is no sound of a well-meaning but inexperienced little brother to be heard.

"Um, Juubei? …_Juubei_?"

[Toshiki]

Toshiki never knew that snow could burn you. But he has been kneeling in the courtyard for nearly an hour now, and the close-packed snow around his bare knees feels far fiercer than any flame. It's as if he's kneeling in the middle of a campfire.

He doesn't look left. He doesn't look right. He keeps his eyes fixed steadily on the pagoda cresting up into the clear winter sky, its lines as sharp as a paper cutout against a blue background. His gaze is cool, calm, unobstructed by tears. The boy by his side succumbed after twenty minutes, but apart from the occasional sniffle now is quiet again.

The two are here for breaking the peace. 

Again.

The monks who were drawn to the commotion in the dormitory had known nothing of what happened – the other boy had been in no condition to say and Toshiki himself had responded with sullen silence to their questions when he had eventually been pulled off the broken and weeping body huddled under him. Both acolytes are covered head to toe in a liberal spatter of blood, which has dried to an eggshell finish in the sharp breeze and now flakes away from their skin at each slight movement.

None of it is Toshiki's.

Most of the time he can brush off his fellow 'brothers'' sidelong looks and snide comments – he treats them with a kind of haughty contempt that keeps him separate, and also invites a certain amount of… not respect, exactly, but… _caution_ is the word; a certain amount of _caution_ in the other boys' dealings with him. They know what it means to provoke him, after all, and had they forgotten, they've just been provided with a sharp and lasting reminder.

Apparently they hadn't all learned their lesson after all, since he had made short work of their leader before the adults had separated them, but he had heard distinctly the hiss _"gaijin dog"_ from one corner as Shun gripped his shoulder painfully and shaken him in a demand that he explain himself. Toshiki had lunged at the speaker, but the bigger monk had yanked him harshly back and he had tripped and fallen to the floor. No one else, it seems, heard the comment, but Toshiki isn't about to forget it. He shan't act on it now, but when the time comes – as it surely will – for him to teach that particular boy to leave him in peace there will be an extra grim enthusiasm in his blows for that particular remark. That's for sure.

But for now, he takes his punishment in stoic silence. There's a silent defiance in his eyes as he stares unrelentingly at the main temple complex: a challenge for them to do their worst. Whatever they may try, he won't be broken. He won't be controlled.

Toshiki hasn't yet learned to box off pain, push it into a corner of his mind where he can be separate and unaffected by it, and the cold burns and bites into the sparse flesh around his bony knees. But he has learned the futility of tears. Crying won't ease the hurt, and should the dam of pride he has built up around himself ever be burst, what good will it do him? For Toshiki, tears would be a sign of disgrace, a sign that he has stopped fighting and crumbles before a master… and he has promised himself he will never, _ever _do that. He will never fall to his knees in defeat; he will never stop struggling against what life throws at him. He will keep moving forwards battling against the tide every step of the way. Nothing in this world is ever going to beat him.

[Kadsuki]

The small dojo is located slightly away from the main complex of the Fuuchouin estate. The path that leads to it intersects several thick bamboo groves and passes through one of the many well-tended gardens that surround the manor, where carefully raked gravel ripples and flows like wave-sculpted sand on a seashore down to the ornamental pond from which issues the subdued rush of the miniature waterfall and the occasional lazy splash of a koi flicking its fins against the blossom-speckled surface of the water. Past the little teahouse and down another groove cut into the vibrant bamboo lanes, and the low building comes into view; a perfectly maintained example of Muromachi architecture that preserves a safe, clean space in which to train the heirs of the clan in the traditional styles of the Fuuchouin-ryuu. 

Today, two pairs of _geta_ sandals and two carefully folded kimono, large and small, on the low step up to the main floor area show that it is currently in use, if the light but deliberate footfalls and the occasional sound of something hitting the ground and rolling aren't clues enough. The screens have been slid open enough to allow the air and light to circulate freely, and the two figures darting about the interior come into brief view now and again in the sun-splashed entrance before a roll, a dash or an elegant few steps backwards take them, dancer-like, into the shadowed inside once more. 

Kadsuki is fighting for breath, sweating hard even in the cool breeze that whispers through the open screens and brushes against the delicate wind chime hung in the opening. His usual attire is far too constricting for the agility he needs here, so it has been discarded for now and he wears a small training _gi_ of soft, light cloth. It serves as no protection against the quickfire lash of the threads, however, and it is marked at key defensive points with tears through which droplets of blood have blossomed like small red flowers against a field of fresh snow. His father is going easy on him, but to learn a proper defensive style, one must run the risk of being hurt if the attacks are not parried effectively enough.

Kadsuki hits the floor awkwardly and manages to roll out of the way of the strings that come lashing towards him: left, above, left, right. They leave small scuffs on the tatami mat and the last one comes close enough for the air displacement to puff the hair back from his face, but this time he remains untouched. He snaps back up into a crouch, the brand new bells all but sparkling between his fingers as he sends three slender threads snaking through the air towards his father's far too relaxed form. Kadsuki's lungs are burning as he pants, and Tsukihiko hasn't even broken a sweat yet. 

"Ah!"

Thread meets thread, the silken strands coiling out of nowhere and slicing Kadsuki's attack to pieces. His string falls to the floor, lifeless as a fishing line the fish are too smart to bite. 

"Naïve, naïve," Tsukihiko reprimands with a grim smile. "You'll attack me from the front like that? Think about your weapons, Kadsuki. How do they work? How can you use them best?" He regards the still-crouched figure of the small boy watching him intently. "Well, what now? What are you going to do?"

Kadsuki doesn't answer for the moment. He glances away slightly, a small line creasing his brows as he considers. Then his eyes snap back to their target and there is steel in them that's completely at odds with the demure kimono-clad figure who carries his name for most of the time. Out here, freed from the confines of the house, another Threadspinner is beginning to emerge. A chain of five strings twisting around one another arcs to the left, hooking around towards his father's back, only to be broken by the same parry as before. 

"Better!" Tsukihiko calls, before Kadsuki's _real_ attack, the single thread that had looped itself discreetly through the slats in the screen to the right, connects with his arm, slipping a noose around his wrist as Tsukihiko's attention is directed towards the feint.

"Good, very good!" Tsukihiko lets his arm relax against the strong threads that can cut flesh as easily as cheesewire when struggled against, his own string severing the noose. "What are you stopping for?"

That is all the encouragement Kadsuki needs. It's time to try something, something he's only sneaked a look at in one of the library's battle scrolls but is sure he can pull off. Ten, twenty, thirty separate strings uncoil from their bell-spools and are launched into the air, shining and glittering in the pale sunlight. Sweat beads on the boy's forehead as he begins to weave. He's never controlled this many at once before.

Like a cat's cradle being controlled by invisible fingers, the flying threads begin to dance, pulled into the shape of a great spider web rushing through the air. Struts, connectors… it's taking too long. He didn't know -- there's so much to think about, too much to control, to move, to hold taut, to weave into position --

Somewhere, at the centre, a string snaps.

Kadsuki cries out, equal parts pain and surprise, as the web seemingly explodes from the inside, one of the threads whipping back and furrowing a deep groove up his cheek, narrowly missing his eye. He stumbles back and sits down hard, his hand snapping up to cover the injury. Teeth gritted, both eyes scrunched up against the pain, he hears quick footsteps and then his father's hands are on him, tipping his head up towards the light and gently moving his hand away from his face. There is something asked of him, he doesn't catch what, but he nods anyway, responding to the calm assurance in that voice. It hurts, but he knows he'll be all right. They'll look after him. Then he's lifted up – luckily with his size and weight he's no burden to carry – and feels the cool air wash around him as Tsukihiko carries him with smooth quick steps along the path back to the house. They'll look after him.

Ten minutes later, Kakei Mamoru arrives with his needles. They glitter in the morning light, ready and eager to serve their master as he tends to his young charge in the way that the Kakei line has for generations. Not to worry.

They'll look after him.

* * * * *

(Oh dear, I'm illustrating my own fics now… There's no hope left for me, is there? Not so much a 'Small Beginnings' doodle, but certainly inspired by spending far too much time thinking about Kadsuki and Toshiki: www.angelfire .com/moon/starvega/fanart/Kadsuki.Toshiki.html -- spaced so ff.net doesn't eat the address) 


	5. V Age 11 & 10: As you mean to go on…

_(Just a quick note – thanks to __A Girl Named Goo for pointing out my silly mistake **laughs** yep, I'm an idiot ^__^ Chapter 1 altered accordingly)_

As you mean to go on…

Age 11/10

[Juubei]

Sure-footed feet race up the grey stone steps, so fast they almost fly over the rising surface in their impatience to get to where they want to go. Juubei turns when he reaches the top, too excited to give the surrounding buildings more than a cursory glance. He all but dances in impatience as he calls down to his mother and sister making their more sedate way towards him, "hey! Hurry up, come on!" His feet feel like they have springs attached to their soles, so difficult is it to keep them still, and when Sakura glances up and laughs at his enthusiasm he can't bear to stand around and wait for them. 

"Mother, I'm going on ahead!" he calls, and before she can call him back and tell him to behave himself and remember to make a good impression he is gone. Make a good impression? Of course he knows he needs to do that – this is without a doubt the most important day of his eleven years of life. Today, for the first time, he's going to meet with the Lord of the Fuuchouin clan, not to mention…

…Not to mention the one a tiny corner of his mind can't help but think of as _his_ Fuuchouin. The heir to the entire clan, only a year younger than Juubei himself, to whom he will pledge his life in service. There's no feel of being forced in this idea, Juubei has been raised to consider this the highest honour for as long as he can remember. And today is the day – at long last, the day he will finally meet the young master whom he was born to protect.

Is it any wonder, then, that he's never felt quite as alive as he does right now? He can feel each hair on his head fill with the heat of the late summer sun, almost as if it had come down from the sky to rest upon his shoulders. The smells of summer flood him, so alive and vibrant he can't help but think of them as the scent of green and yellow – how could any thriving plants, any rushing stream, any wide blue sky smell like this, he wonders.

He is so caught up in the day itself that he has been lost for a good five minutes before he realises. Not good. He is supposed to proceed directly to the main reception hall where his father and the Fuuchouin chief are waiting for him… but exactly where _is_ that, again? Maybe he shouldn't have left his mother and gone ahead alone.

_Not going to be worried. Not going to spoil this day._ Juubei heads along the gap he finds himself in between two large buildings. Not worried. The complex is bigger than he imagined, and he feels vaguely awed at the thought that although he has lived on the estate his entire life, this is a new world opening up to him. He has never had reason to be here – in fact this whole area has been off-limits to him until today, and he has no idea where he is. He walks on.

Rounding another of the long low buildings, each of which is easily twice as big as his own house, he's thankful to see one of the ornamental gardens that surround the main living quarters. He sighs, more relieved than he'd care to admit to himself. Now he's on the outskirts of the complex, it should be simple enough to circle back to the place where he had left his mother and Sakura. From there he's sure he'll be able to find the reception hall. Juubei starts forward determinedly, then pauses. Wait… what was that just now?

There! There it is again!

"Koto…?" he murmurs to himself as he strains his ears harder. Quiet, muted by distance and vegetation, still… floating on the sweet-smelling breeze come the faint strains of the instrument. But it isn't coming from the complex, Juubei is sure. If anything… it's coming from that direction, away from the closely clustered buildings. Now he's looking, Juubei can see the neat path through the rock garden actually continues through the bamboo plantation that frames the area.

One foot already on the path, he pauses in a moment of indecision. He really needs to be going, he has somewhere he needs to be, but…

Again comes the sound, the gentle plucking of the strings carrying across the hazy afternoon. And quite suddenly, all hesitation vanishes. Juubei plunges forwards down the path, as thoughtless and heedless of his actions as if the piper in the story were making those irresistible sounds, drawing him ever on, far away from Hamelin. Perhaps some sensible part of his mind rationalises that he's going to ask for directions, perhaps he just goes without a second thought.

Where eager feet raced up steps, now they pick their swift way along the path, trotting over a small bridge that arches elegantly over a shallow koi pond and almost tripping in their haste as he passes through another grove of bamboo. Juubei slows as the sound grows clearer, his feet losing their urgency as he strains for all that he can hear. Slower, slower… he puts out a hand to the small sapling growing by the edge of the grove, and the sun, fractured and faceted into brilliant pinpoints of light by the trees that crowd around the small clearing, dazzles him for a moment. He blinks away the wheeling flashes that speckle his sight, and steps forward.

It's a teahouse… that is the first thing his bewildered senses come up with. Old, very old, but still younger than the rest of the compound. The sunlight plays around it, highlighting its outer ornamentation and throwing its interior into an inviting shade. And inside--

_Kami,_ his mind whispers, crosspatching for a brief moment with a memory many years old. A tiny, delicate figure seated in perfect _seiza_ position before the instrument, eyes closed as they lose themselves in the music. The air seems to turn to glassy water, magnifying tiny details and blurring the background into insignificance. The clean-cut lines of the deep fuchsia kimono, the tiny glimpse of the paler pink undergarment at the throat and wrists that matches the elaborately tied _obi _belt perfectly… the child's rich brown hair, thick and glossy and only a shade darker than his own, hanging down to brush against the jaw line and leaving the nape of that long elegant neck exposed… Juubei feels the blush come to his cheeks as he takes an involuntary gasp of the fragrant summer air.

It's only a quiet inhalation, lost amongst the chatter of the leaves all around, but it is enough. The notes cease and the child snaps a sharp dark glance in Juubei's direction. "Who's there? Identify yourself!"

The tone is confident and authoritative: the voice of one used to being answered. But it is not that which gets Juubei's attention, rather the long koto string that snaps through the air, almost invisible save where it catches the sun and glitters like a diamond thread. It is only pure instinct that flashes out one of his long needles to counter it, and saves Juubei from a nasty lash. "Juubei!" he calls out quickly, "I'm Kakei Juubei!"

"Kakei?" The delicate little face is transformed in an instant, so that Juubei wonders if he really saw the steely glint in those honey brown eyes that now sparkle with warmth and vitality. "You're Juubei?" Small feet slip gracefully into the _geta _sandals placed on the step of the teahouse, and the child comes to stand only a few paces from him. Placing a hand over the place where the folds of the kimono overlap, the light voice continues, "so you're going to be my doctor when we're older? I'm Kadsuki!"

"Ahh, _y-you're_ Kadsuki?" Juubei honestly doesn't know what to say. His eyes have widened to approximately twice their usual size and he opens and closes his mouth a few times before any more words will come, his cheeks burning increasingly brighter. "Wait, t-the heir to the Fuuchouin clan is a _girl?_"

Kadsuki laughs. "I'm a _boy_," he insists, but he doesn't seem angry at Juubei's mistake. The small part of Juubei's mind that doesn't seem to be frozen solid like the rest wonders if he's used to that assumption being made about him. He's certainly prettier than any girl Juubei can ever remember seeing…

"This is just a family rule," he continues, indicating his clothes with a small smile. He seems unaware of Juubei's still-open mouthed stare, or else he politely ignores it as a well brought up Fuuchouin should. "Before the age of fifteen we have to wear kimono when we practice the koto," he explains.

"Oh… i-is that so?" is about the most intelligent thing Juubei can come up with. Kadsuki laughs, whether at the statement or Juubei's general cluelessness he can't tell, but the bright, happy sound in the summer light is infectious, and after a moment he joins in, their laughter mingling and floating up and away, lost in the expanse of the wide blue sky.

[Toshiki]

Summer rain is always the worst kind.

The water beats heavily down on the dusty lane, raising craters in the dust that has accumulated on the ground all this long summer. The heavens are clouded over, deep and endless variations on grey stretching as far as the eye can see, now opened up and slamming down watery missiles as if someone up there has a personal vengeance to carry out against the small huddle of figures sitting on the bench beside the bus stop.

Rain pounds down onto a unprotected head, matting soft hair and turning it from its usual flaxen shade into a river of dark gold. Rivulets glide down Toshiki's spiky bangs and collect at the ends, sending droplets dripping to run along his nose and down his cheeks. He doesn't attempt to clear his vision, doesn't react in any way at all. He hasn't spoken a word since the man by his side found him.

The other few passengers waiting for the bus, mostly old ladies with arms full of poodle, keep their distance and stare darkly at the pair from under the bottoms of their umbrellas. Shun is wearing the familiar and well-trusted robes of a local monk, but the foreign-looking kid is dressed like some cheap hoodlum, all ripped denim over a black shirt with the English words "I'm Only in It for the Beer!" printed in red under a grinning smiley-face. Shun puts '_where on earth did the kid get those clothes_' high up on his mental list of Things Not To Ask Uryuu About, and shakes his head slightly.

"Forty-five miles," he says quietly, "that's quite impressive, Uryuu. No money, no supplies, and you go for three weeks before we find you."

Toshiki doesn't lift his eyes from the mud that's evolving between his planted feet. If anything, it begins to rain harder. Shun would offer him the use of his umbrella, but he knows it's pointless. The kid treasures his pride to such a degree that he would happily drown with that slightly contemptuous look on his face before he would let anyone from the temple hold out a hand to pull him into a nearby life raft. Beneath that tatty jacket it is obvious the boy has lost a lot of weight, even if Shun couldn't feel the changes in his ki that tell of too many hard nights and too little sleep and even fewer square meals, and yet he knows that if he hadn't decided to come looking, Uryuu would never have come back to the temple on his own. Too much to ask that he admit he still needs somewhere to call home, someone to look after him. Of course there are children younger than he who have lived all alone on the streets for years, but this one has grown up under the protection of the temple and is not yet tough enough to be without it, whatever he might want to think.

But the fact that he put up no struggle when Shun finally tracked him down to the lonely underside of a motorway bridge, the fact that he simply lowered his eyes and followed without a word, says more than Toshiki himself ever would. Stubborn the kid may be, and exasperatingly prideful, but he isn't stupid, and he isn't suicidal either. He knows what's best for him, even if he doesn't like it.

"What would you have done, Uryuu?" he asks softly, using the name the temple had bestowed on the boy when he was left, tiny and screaming and only a few days old, at their gates in a rainstorm much like this one: the flowing rain for which he had been named. "If I hadn't come for you, what would you have done?"

Toshiki still doesn't reply, but he does lift his head, tossing his head to flick the drops of water out of his eyes as he stares down the quiet road. "…'s coming," he states, rising to his feet as the small bus crests the hill and starts down the gentle slope towards them. He flashes a glare at a pair of old ladies huddled together under their umbrellas, staring pointedly as they quite obviously whisper to one another about him, and Shun stands and puts a hand on the boy's tensed shoulder.

"Tell me something," he says as the bus rattles to a stop beside them and the gaggle of passengers push past them, eager to escape the storm, "I _am_ bringing you home with me, whatever the answer, but… what have you learned from this? You're half-starved, wet, cold, and I shan't ask you what you've been doing to survive, Uryuu, but despite all that… you never tried to come back. Is it really so terrible to be with us? Would you really rather be out here by yourself?"

The half-glare Toshiki gives him, blue eyes empty and lost, simply confirms what he already knew.

[Kadsuki]

"Peach?"

Kadsuki tilts back his head and smiles contentedly at the other boy perched in the crook of the wonderfully gnarled and twisted tree above his head. He had laughed at Juubei's suggestion that he join him, twitching the hem of his kimono with a delicate quirk of an eyebrow. Kadsuki has never climbed a tree in his life. And besides, he's quite comfortable sitting on this cushion, his back resting against the solid bole of the tree, thank you. "Please," he says, cupping his hands together, and Juubei plucks one of the soft ripe fruits from its stem and drops it neatly into the centre of his palms before taking another for himself.

Kadsuki munches quietly, enjoying the feel of the night all around him. The sun set nearly an hour ago, and by now the only lights are those coming from the manor on the hill above them and the line of red lanterns that stretch down the slope through the peach gardens, and also the tiny glowing points of fireflies burning in the air all around like a floating string of fairy lights: a private light show just for the two of them. He has never been allowed out this late before, and he knows that his permission tonight has everything to do with the Kakei boy in the tree above him. The thought makes him smile, and he brings his hand to his lips to lick at the juice from the slightly overripe fruit that has trickled down his fingers. Passing his tongue over the spot on his finger where he was bitten earlier, he is still surprised at how quickly and confidently Juubei treated him, taking the pain away with a smile and the quick flash of a silver needle.

"Ne, Juubei…"

"Hmm?"

"I'm sorry… about earlier." It's not really Kadsuki's fault, of course: how could he have known that Juubei was supposed to be being introduced to his father? When the other boy had shown up during his koto practice, Kadsuki had simply assumed Juubei had been sent out to find him and make his acquaintance. That's why he had taken his new friend for a tour of the complex, beginning with the teahouse and dojo and ending up beside the wide river where Juubei had ended up making that silly promise to him: that very sweet but dreadfully old-fashioned promise that he would protect him forever. Kaduki had laughed and teased him about it gently, but a part of him couldn't help but feel strangely like one of prince Genji's high-flown loves, and the telltale flush that had appeared in his cheeks had probably burned brightly enough for its residue still to be visible when his father and Kakei-sensei had finally found them, Tsukihiko with his silently exasperated _dealing-with-my-impossible-son_ expression while Mamoru had glared icily at Juubei as he introduced him to the Fuuchouin chief. "Kakei-sensei looked about ready to do something really horrible to you with those needles when they found us."

There is a quiet laugh from amongst the interlaced branches above him. "My father wouldn't dishonour his needles with that, I promise you. He'll probably just give me some extra chores around the house or something. Or maybe nothing at all – I _was_ doing my duty after all, wasn't I? Looking after you…" And belatedly, "besides, it wasn't your fault, Kadsuki."

"Mmm, maybe." Kadsuki rests his head against the rough bark of the tree and fixes his eyes on the Juubei-shaped shadow perched over his head. Living his life inside the compound, being taught by a private tutor – the best that money can buy, naturally – Kadsuki doesn't have much experience being around other people his own age. Juubei seems very odd and special in his narrowed worldview, and he has a desire to keep him close by. "If you don't have too many chores… maybe you could come and play with me again soon?" He is sure not to say 'tomorrow'. "Father said you're welcome here anytime, now that you've been officially introduced."

A rustle of leaves and he gets the impression that Juubei is looking down at him through the surrounding darkness. "I'd like to do that. I could come again…" Juubei deliberately avoids saying 'in the morning'. "…Really soon."

Kadsuki smiles and his eyes slowly drift closed, his body relaxing in the warm presence of the other boy. Before he's quite aware of it he has fallen into a light doze, and the dreams carried to him on the balmy summer night are those of earnest blue eyes and strong yet soothing hands, of looks that say loyalty and a touch that promises friendship, no matter where their paths may lead.


	6. VI Age 13 & 12: Plum rain

Plum rain

Age 13/12

[Juubei]

Juubei leaps the large puddle without slowing down and turns the corner for the last stretch, the last few meters' sprint towards the shelter of the Kakei home. Kadsuki is straight behind him, one arm held over his head in a futile attempt to protect some of his hair from the rain the skies have opened up and loosed upon the day, the other bunching the material of his kimono, holding as much as possible of the long hem off the ground and away from his legs so he can run unhindered. Even so, the expensive fabric is spattered with mud and both boys are soaked through from head to toe, and Juubei just knows that somehow it is going to be all his fault that the rainstorm decided to roll in out of nowhere while he and Kadsuki were playing out in the open with nowhere to run for cover. This sort of thing always seems to happen to him. 

The two literally dive through the air to reach the shelter of the covered terrace and sit there a moment, both panting, Kadsuki with his head lolled forward and leaning against Juubei's shoulder. It's that warm damp patch against his side that rouses Juubei after a moment, and he pokes his friend's ribs with a gentle finger. "Hey, you're dripping wet. You'll get ill if you don't change out of those clothes." He takes hold of Kadsuki's hand and pulls him to his feet.

"You're just as wet as I am," Kadsuki replies, but Juubei just shakes his head and opens the door. Kadsuki doesn't seem to realise that that isn't the important thing, _he_ is, and its Juubei's duty to take care of him. 

At the sound of voices in the entranceway Aya pokes her head out of the kitchen, wiping her hands on a dishcloth. She gasps at the sorry sight of her son and the Fuuchouin heir. _"Juubei!"_

Juubei winces. Yep, his fault all right.

"Just look at the _state_ of…" she hurries toward them and crouches before Kadsuki, removing his hands from the hem of his kimono and examining the dark patches and stains winging their way across the pastel cloth, then sighing and gesturing to the paler strands against the brown hair tucked up in her bun. "You're turning me grey, the two of you. Kadsuki-kun, I can't send you home in this state. Would you like a bath while I try and save this? I'm sure we still have one of Sakura's old yukata that you can wear while I try and get this cleaned up for you."

"Ah, I'm sorry to be so much trouble, Kakei-san," Kadsuki apologises quickly, already reaching behind to loosen his obi. "But Juubei's not to blame. We were just playing."

"Nevertheless, he should be looking after you, Kadsuki-kun," Aya turns to the offender. "Juubei, run some water and show our guest where everything is. I'll find something for him to wear afterwards – you just look after him for now." As Juubei leads Kadsuki towards the bathroom he can't quite fail to notice the look his mother sends after him. Oh yes, there will be Words later about this, he's sure…

"I got you into trouble again, didn't I?" Kadsuki says quietly as Juubei slides the door closed behind them. He looks around the small white-tiled bathroom with curious eyes, finally working the intricate tie at his back and beginning to unwrap the long belt from his middle. "Sorry."

"Don't worry about it." Juubei moves over to start running the hot water, eyeing the bottles lined up beside it dubiously. He isn't sure which ones should go in for that clean herbal smell in the water whenever his mother draws a bath, so in the end he settles for uncapping all of them and dropping a small amount from each into the swirling water. Behind him Kadsuki's kimono rustles, and as his cheeks suddenly flush and warm up his movements become more hurried. "I'm done here, so I'll just be outside if you need anyth--"

"Wait." Kadsuki, already half out of his kimono and holding it closed with one hand, steps in front of him before he can escape out of the door. The smaller boy looks his dripping, muddy form up and down with his mouth set in the way Juubei has come to know and fear. "Aren't you going to get cleaned up too? What if _you_ get sick?"

"Oh, I-I'll be fine," Juubei evades. "I'll go in once you've done, there's the rule of guests first you know and…"

The little pout gets larger and that familiar _I want something and I'm going to get it_ crease appears between Kadsuki's eyebrows. "You're so old-fashioned, Juubei! Are you embarrassed? _I'm_ not. Just pretend we're at an onsen, or--"

At first Juubei mentally thanks whatever gods watch over out-of-their-depth 13-year-old boys for the knock on the bathroom door and his mother's voice calling through the wood, "Kadsuki-kun? Here's one of Sakura's yukata from two years ago. It might be a little big for you, though." Then, however, she adds "do you have your kimono ready? I can take it and start getting it cleaned up now."

"Thank you, Kakei-san," Kadsuki calls back, and with a whisper of pink silk Juubei only just has time to spin round to stare, mortified, at the tiled wall as the door is slid open a little way and Kadsuki's hands appear in the corner of his field of vision holding everything he was wearing a moment ago. Another swatch of colour that he assumes are the borrowed clothes from Sakura, and the door shuts and he's alone again. With Kadsuki. Oh.

There's a chuckle from behind him, and he can feel Kadsuki surveying his back with that amused look on his face. "All right then, fine. You can stay like that if you want." The sound of his feet on the tiled floor moves away, and after a moment Juubei can hear the slide of the shower hose from its holder on the wall. A few fumbling sounds (apparently Kadsuki isn't used to working a modern shower attachment, and it takes him a few tries before he gets it to do what he wants) and the hiss of the water drowns out any other noises.

Juubei stays where he is, staring desperately hard at the gaps between the tiles in front of his nose and trying very much not to think about anything at all. It isn't working very well. Now and then Kadsuki's voice cuts in on his non-contemplation. "Can I use this shampoo?"

"Um, yes…"

And back to wall-study it is.

Finally the patter of water stops and is replaced by the splashing of Kadsuki getting into the bath, and Juubei counts to ten and turns round hesitantly. Only Kadsuki's head can be seen above the cloudy water – it looks like he did put the wrong bottle in there after all – and he is watching Juubei with a bright, interested and altogether far too pleased with himself expression on his face.

"Um…" Juubei hesitates awkwardly, hand hovering protectively over the ties for his jacket before Kadsuki gives an exaggerated sigh and rolls his eyes, closing and covering them with his fingers. "Is this better?"

Not wasting time to answer, Juubei pulls off his clothes and washes quickly, then crosses over to the tub and rolls back the plastic cover, and stops again. There's another short internal struggle before he suddenly wonders if Kadsuki is peeking between his fingers, and with a small yelp he clambers hurriedly in to squat at the other end. The tub is only small, but if he keeps his knees bent protectively up against his torso he can get away with not touching Kadsuki at all. Still, after a few minutes of being left in peace he slowly begins to relax: the milky jade water is warm and comes up to his chest – as Kadsuki sits across from him it laps against his chin, and when he uncovers his eyes he giggles and pulls a face, and Juubei tries not to snort laughter in case it encourages him.

Finally he heaves a contented sigh, pushing his wet hair out of his eyes and tipping his head back onto his shoulders when there's a great splash of water from Kadsuki's end of the tub and half the bathwater jumps out and crashes down on him. Spluttering and snorting the herbal taste from his mouth and nose Juubei squints incredulously in Kadsuki's direction, where the smaller boy is grinning impishly with his palms flat on the surface of the water, then lifts them up ready to slap them down again and give Juubei a second dousing when the other boy dives towards him with a sound caught somewhere between a roar and a laugh, his discomfort either forgotten or relegated to the back of his mind for the moment, grabbing the younger boy's shoulders and ducking him beneath the surface. 

Kadsuki comes back up spluttering and giggling. "H-hey, aren't you supposed to be looking after me? Not trying to kill me!" He tries to brace himself against the sides of the narrow tub but his hands slip on the smooth surface, and he squawks and clings to Juubei for balance, when the other boy mock-growls "I'm your doctor, _Fuuchouin-sama_, and I know just how long I can hold you under to make you sorry!" He tries to duck him again, but Kadsuki slips out of his grasp and scrambles to the other end… but the bath really is too small for that and Juubei catches him again easily, chanting "are you sorry, are you sorry?" as more water spills over the side and swamps the tiled floor.

[Toshiki]

Fifty-two small boys punch and kick the air in unison. At the end of the set fifty-two enthusiastic voices fill the temple grounds, expelling the _ki_ tightened in their muscles and ligaments into a spring morning already shimmering with heat. 

"Again!"

The set begins again, perfectly structured martial forms that flow one to the next. Each strike precise, measured; each kick powerful, graceful – the movements honed and refined through the centuries of Murasame tradition. 

Toshiki stands at the top of the stairs that clamber precariously down from the great temple hall. Arms crossed in front of him, he looks over the fifty-two fierce, intensely private battles going on before him. None of the fighters even reaches up to his breastbone. 

The set finishes, the young students frozen, fully extended, in the final strike. There is no movement save the slight tremble of tensed muscles as Toshiki starts down the steps. Below him the students are spaced out across the grounds: twenty on the lowest level, in the courtyard itself; twenty on the higher bridge at the foot of the steps; twelve ranged on the wide steps themselves. Now he moves among them, correcting a posture here and there, throwing the occasional light punch to force a demonstration of acceptable blocking technique, asking low questions and meeting the correct answers with only a twitch of a smile and perhaps a quirked eyebrow. This is something he does often, and he does it very well. As the foremost of the boys his own age, he is the most qualified to take the younger students through the basic skills that form the foundation for later mastery of the _ki_ techniques. Out here there are no musty texts idling full of self-important Buddhist ponderings, no classmates with a scathing comment or sideways sneer, waiting for an opportunity to start a fight (only if weighted around three-to-one in their favour, of course), just a group of young boys not unlike him a few years ago and the quiet acknowledgment of his teachers who have granted him this responsibility.

His foot shoots out, pushing against the calf of the small wiry boy beside him.  "Lower that stance a little more… There. Does it hurt?"

"…Mm."

He nods. "That means you're doing it right."

The session continues. The younger boys all listen with grave faces; both Toshiki's skill and his reputation in the school are well known to them, but here only the former matters. They know this, Toshiki knows this, and a certain ever-present weight seems lifted from his shoulders as he trains with them. He doesn't let up on them for an instant, demanding complete attention, the fullest outreaches of effort from each of the boys moment by moment, but perhaps there is a loosening of the _ki_ as it flows through him, tensions ebbing away.

The morning draws on, and towards noon he turns toward the east and looks up into a sky rapidly closing in with clouds. The wind comes before it, a warm breeze that ruffles through his hair and slides past to enfold the temple grounds in its silent rush.

"The rain's coming," he says, and the chill in his voice makes the younger children turn and exchange glances, troubled for some reason they cannot place.

[Kadsuki]

"Here." Juubei's mother turns and hands an oversized canvas umbrella to her son and looks the two boys over carefully, making a final check that the Fuuchouin heir looks about as presentable as the rules of his station require. Seemingly satisfied, she nods and straightens again. "Take him straight home, Juubei. Straight home, understand?"

There's probably a suppressed _yes, yes, I know_ sigh in Juubei's voice, but he answers with a quiet "all right" before stepping down into the narrow entrance and slipping on his shoes. As Kadsuki makes his bow and says all the things a guest is required to remember to thank a host for, the older boy waits patiently below the overhanging roof until the courtesies are over. Then Kadsuki hops into his own delicate _geta_ sandals and comes over to join him, moving as fast as the freshly washed kimono will let him. Juubei hoists the umbrella over their heads, careful to pull Kadsuki in close beside him to shield the smaller boy from any rogue drops, and the two begin the walk up the long and winding path that leads back to the main estate.

Outside the warm enclosed space under the umbrella, the plum rain pounds down fiercely onto the clean earth, cratering the soft ground and bringing out a rich brown colour that already seems spilling over with summer. The large waxy leaves on the trees and bushes that line the way in clumps and clenches are beaded with droplets of water, and the sound of the rain hitting and bouncing off the fresh greenery all around them adds a satisfying counterpoint to the beating on the canvas just over their heads.

Still feeling overly warm from the bath, Kadsuki fans himself with the hand that isn't looped companionably around Juubei's waist while his lungs strain a little for breath in the heavy humid air. Suddenly he stops, and his hand moves from Juubei's hip to tug at his sleeve instead. "Come on… I don't want to go home just yet." He sets off at a typical Kadsuki pace, disregarding the confining tube of material around his body as much as is possible, and since his hand is by now firmly clenched around Juubei's wrist – the one holding the umbrella, no less – the other boy has little choice but to stumble along after him, leaving his protests of "but Kadsuki… my mother said…" behind to get soaked in the downpour.

But Kadsuki isn't planning to go very far. Soon Juubei can recognise the ornamental bridge over the stream and the bamboo thicket beyond, their familiar trickle and rustle drowned out by the drum of the rain before he is dragged over, pulled through, and finally stands in the clearing that houses the small teahouse where all this began. He pauses, just standing and looking with some nameless expression hiding behind his eyes, and in turn Kadsuki stops and glances back at him, a small smile playing on his lips. Could it really be almost two years since he first saw Juubei in this place, standing right where he is now, a younger Kadsuki running towards another boy who was even then bigger, stronger, more centred than Kadsuki thinks he could ever hope to be.

But his patience doesn't last all that long, and he's soon tugging at Juubei's wrist until the older boy comes back to him, blinking a little as if waking up from a daze, and they cross the final few yards of open space to the dry, enclosed privacy of the low freestanding room.

With their footwear removed and lined up neatly on the step, the two boys make themselves comfortable on the tatami floor. Kadsuki takes up his accustomed _seiza_ position by the koto placed there for him and Juubei sits close by, watching him sidelong as the smaller boy removes a small fan tucked into his obi and gives it a few desultory swipes through the close air before leaning over the instrument to fan at Juubei's sweat-dotted face and neck, smiling as his friend gasps appreciatively at the movement of the air across his face and through his hair. Then he hands the fan over to Juubei and reseats himself, raising both hands to hover gently above the koto, his smile softening as the strings give a low hum of recognition. The vibration ceases as he places his hands where they want to be, strings resting comfortably against the hardening calluses on the delicate pads of his fingers, and plucks a series of gentle notes from the instrument that seem to accompany the ebbing and flowing whisper of the weather around them.

"Koto sounds best in the rain, don't you think?"

"When you play it, it always sounds wonderful," Juubei replies and sprawls out on his stomach, close enough to the open doorway that he can reach out a languid arm and feel the raindrops striking his fingers and wrist. He stays there, head buried in his other arm in a way that only just fails to hide the blush spreading in his cheeks, and Kadsuki laughs softly and continues picking at the strings, running through a few simple patterns of tones that flow together and ripple like the eternal stream flowing down toward the sea.

The two remain that way for some time, Juubei's gaze moving back and forth between the rainswept clearing and Kadsuki's form as he sits by the instrument, the gentle notes filling up the space between them as Kadsuki plays and begins telling him a story he claims to have read in the library at home, a tale about the moon-maiden and the soldier with the strength of ten (and soon enough Juubei's blush is growing again, and he's beginning to be sure that Kadsuki is just making this up on the spot to tease him), and above them the sun moves across the sky and breaks free of the clouds, the rain lightens to a patter, and finally ends.

Kadsuki's fingers still and the last lingering notes fade, and he stands and goes to the folding screens, stroking the wooden lattice thoughtfully as he looks out at the world before them. "Shall we go back?" he asks softly.

"…Mm." Juubei stretches and eventually gets his feet underneath him, joining his friend at the sunlit entrance. "…And what happened at the end?" he asks. "Of the story, I mean."

Kadsuki's eyes tip up to his, and there seems to be surprise in that sharp dark glitter that Juubei doesn't already know the answer. "Why, she took him with her back to the moon, of course. They went in her flower-boat, and he kept his promise and protected her forever, just as he'd said."

"Oh." Knowing what he knows, Juubei doesn't have any weighty response to that, so instead he steps down and places his hand on Kadsuki's shoulder to balance his friend as he slips his _geta_ back on. His fingers tighten a fraction before he releases his grip and the two start back along the path towards home. "I'm glad to hear it."

* * * 

_In Kadsuki's story he's playing a little with the kanji in his and Juubei's names – enough so that Juubei picks up on this and gets accordingly embarrassed ^_^_


	7. VII Age 14 & 13: Burning the Bridge of D...

Burning the Bridge of Dreams

Age 14/13

[Juubei]

Juubei runs, clutching one hand to his chest, holding tight to Kadsuki as if he will slip away into the darkness the moment he lets go, his eyes fixed straight ahead as the warm tears slide down his cheeks. Behind them Sakura's footfalls are lost in the crash and roar of the night. She keeps pace silently, slipping into the position she will hold from now on: rearguard, follower, sister to both of them. The night folds itself around them, but the fierce glow from the blaze at their backs lights up the sky as clearly as if the sun had slipped from its accustomed place and crashed to earth in a glory of fire and destruction. The close-packed trees through which they run seem to shiver at the oncoming inferno as if sensing their own destruction, and the three children are not the only small and frightened creatures fleeing the flames. At one point a panicked deer crashes out from the undergrowth, nearly running into Juubei and sending the two boys tumbling helplessly down a short slope. With Sakura's help Juubei picks himself up and pulls Kadsuki after him, fighting to put more distance between them and the destruction of their ancient home. Juubei keeps his tearstained gaze on the narrow path before them. He will not look back. He cannot look back.

Juubei runs, clutching one hand to his chest, holding tight to Kadsuki as if he will slip away into the darkness the moment he lets go. This is something he cannot afford to lose. The sudden flare of light from the Fuuchouin manor had rolled over the countryside, and Juubei had run with his parents and sister to the window to see a great ball of flame rising up into the night sky as one by one the stars twinkled and were lost to view. His father had not hesitated, out of the door before any of the others had had a chance to react. Wits scattered and trembling Juubei had followed him, only to be grasped by both shoulders and roughly thrust back in the direction of the house, a gruff command to remain where he was. His heart leaden and so tight in his chest he could hardly breathe for it, Juubei had twisted out of Sakura's loose hold on his shirt and slipped away into the night, circling back towards the compound, his mother's voice crying his name inaudible under the name thundering, 

//_Kadsuki// _

rushing 

_//Kadsuki//_

through his veins to hammer mercilessly in his ears. 

_//Kadsuki, Kadsuki, Kadsuki//_

Legs trembling so fiercely he could hardly stand, he had finally made it to the complex's main courtyard, standing at a loss amidst the burning buildings and listening to the screams that seemingly came from everywhere and nowhere all at once, as if the earth had opened up a secret chamber to one of the Hells right below his feet. A running figure had stumbled into him and continued on its way with a snarl and a whiplash of black thread Juubei had been too distracted to block, a red line burning on his cheek as he cast about the burning buildings. _Kadsuki… Kadsuki… where are you, Kadsuki…_ He had closed his eyes, trying desperately to think, praying for some divine flash of inspiration… 

And nothing had come. No twitch from the red cord wrapped securely round his heart, no sudden _knowing…_ Kadsuki was silent.

And Juubei thought he had been afraid _before_. 

Juubei runs, clutching one hand to his chest. Kadsuki himself does not react – he has responded to nothing since Juubei pulled him from the depths of the half-gutted house, and his face tells a tale of confused fear and quiet misery as he runs. Nor does he look where they are going – were Juubei to leap off a sudden cliff right now Kadsuki would unthinkingly follow him. Since his outburst all higher functions have temporarily ceased, and his dulled eyes see nothing but the shadowy figure of the boy tugging him along. His memories of this night will cease with his mother turning and disappearing into the hungry flames – he will not remember hearing Juubei's frantic voice calling out through the billowing smoke as he pushed through the burning doorway in his search for the his friend. Part of the roof had collapsed around Kadsuki, and only an instinctive flinging out of a threadwork had managed to provide a temporary support for the fallen timbers, but the fire had already been spreading further. On Juubei's part, he thinks that the one sight of this endless night that will haunt him the longest is that of Kadsuki's silver threads slowly beginning to burn, the flames running along the delicate strands and eating them away. 

When he had fought his way through the thick smoke and burning rubble to Kadsuki, the other boy had hardly registered his presence, crying out for his mother and fighting to follow her deeper into the blaze. Juubei will never tell Kadsuki what happened then, when the smaller boy went temporarily insane and began kicking and screaming to escape Juubei's grasp and fling himself into the fire, just as he will never tell Kadsuki that as he pulled him out of the inferno of the house Kadsuki writhed and twisted in his grip, sinking his teeth deep into Juubei's hand in a desperate attempt to get away. Juubei can feel the hot blood from the crescent-shaped wound trickling between his fingers, over his knuckles and staining his clothes, his only souvenir of a life that is now irrevocably lost. Now all he has is Kadsuki.

Juubei runs.

[Toshiki]

The dormitory is heavy with sleep. Seventeen boys lie close together on their futons, close enough that one turning over and flinging out a dreaming arm or leg will be sure to wake his neighbour with a jolt. Gathered together in two close-packed rows, they look like a small blanket-wrapped mountain range; quiet and content for the most part, with the occasional shift and subdued avalanche of sheets as someone turns over in the search for a more comfortable position, and once in a while one will sit up and swat the boy next to him with a hissed _"stop doing that with your ki!"_

The eighteenth boy will have no part of the mountain range. Toshiki staked out his space in the corner years ago, and makes sure to keep a comfortable distance between himself and the others.  If he absolutely _has_ to let down his guard when he sleeps, he would rather be separate from the rest – and have a moment's warning if they approach him.

But tonight, at least, he isn't lying sharp and alert in his corner, waiting for any movement from the centre of the room. The low candlelight guttering in the single lamp over the door flutters against his half-closed eyelids and slides over his skin, turning it to gentle bronze. In the mingling shadows his hair is steeped in overlapping shades of dusk: he looks as Japanese as any of the others.

It's almost too much effort to roll onto his back and stretch the entire length of his body, arms to spine to toes, easing the lingering knots of ki from his joints. His limbs feel like warm, heavy blocks of wood as they loll atop the tatami floor – the slow steady pulse that threads through them a reminder of a day's hard training. Meditation, practice of the basic forms and the long hours of focusing ki into a controlled force – pushing a leaf, a ball, a teacup… and only today, being allowed to use that push against a fellow student for the first time.

And it _worked._

Just that memory, the other boy suddenly picked up and thrown into the sandbags packed against the wall of the courtyard… how it had felt to channel that power, the air rippling around the invisible force as the ki-ball flew through the air… it sends a warm thrill through him and he smiles, turning over the cusp of sleep.

Gently his eyes slip closed and the dormitory room retreats behind layer upon layer of pale gauze like spiderwebbing, and the bridge that spans the place of dreams appears before him and the way unrolls before his feet.

The breathing of the sleeping boys washes through the room and laps against the walls, filling it to the brim. Toshiki's eyelids flicker a little as he runs deeper down familiar corridors and across landscapes that can never exist outside the walls of the mind. Outside it is dark and the stars shine coldly on the roofs of the temple that is already drawing down the final stretch to its destruction. There will be no autumn leaves in the courtyard, no snowflakes floating down to land in lazy drifts that swallow the graceful curves of the complex, and this time next year the wind will gust emptily against ruined walls and rubble.

But for now Toshiki can know nothing of this, can know nothing of his own fate, and he runs in his dream, and there's no stopping him.

[Kadsuki]

Kadsuki blinks, and his eyes slowly shift from their fixed stare into the void. He has not been sleeping, but the darkness that has surrounded him since his mother turned and walked away into the bright glare of the flames has lifted somewhat, and he is starting to realise his surroundings again. Which at the moment is more darkness, stretching as far as the eye can see, gaping and empty. He hisses a sharp breath through his teeth and his body jerks in an automatic instinct for escape, but the thin arms wrapped around him tighten and pull him closer to the solid warmth at his side. The brief panic ghosts away as he recognises Juubei's familiar presence beside him, and with that as a reference point in the floating dark the immediate terror drains from him to be replaced by a hollow, lingering numbness. He reaches out, slides uncertain fingers up Juubei's side, over his shoulder and along the arm curled firmly around him until he meets Juubei's hand and intertwines their fingers. He is afraid to break their contact even for a moment in case Juubei should suddenly vanish into the abyss. Opening his mouth, it takes him a minute or so to realise that none of what he is saying is breaking the blanketing silence, and he tries again. 

"…where."

"In the village." Juubei's voice coming out of the darkness is rough, heavy with the tears he has shed, choked with those that are still to come. "I ran and… you wouldn't say anything and. And I headed here…. They said… but you wouldn't… And then we. So then… And then we ran. We ran. But I… I… K-Kadsuki…"

Kadsuki doesn't want to hear any more, He burrows further against Juubei to end the broken stream of words, clinging to him as the only solid thing in the world, the only thing he knows is real. Juubei. Kadsuki isn't cold, he can't feel anything, but somehow he can't stop trembling, and Juubei tightens his grip around Kadsuki's waist and pulls the smaller boy's head in closer to rest in the angle between his shoulder and neck. Kadsuki closes his eyes, hiding his face in the protected area under Juubei's jaw and has a brief fantasy that this is all a dream, a horrible nightmare that in a moment he will be waking up from in the morning light of his own room with the sounds of a busy household starting to stir around him. But he can wait for a hundred years, or more – there is no waking from this, and the older boy holding him close is the only remnant of all that once was.

"Ne, Juubei…" His voice is scratchy from smoke inhalation, and it hurts to get the words out. It's something he must do, however: his mother made him promise…

The fingers of Juubei's free hand slow in their gentle threading though his hair, then after a few seconds start up again. "Mm?"

"I… what are we going to do now?"

"I don't know." Kadsuki feels Juubei shake his head slightly, his jaw rubbing against the top of his head. "I don't know," he repeats softly. 

"I have to go to Tokyo, Juubei." 

"…What? Tokyo?"

A frown creases Kadsuki's forehead as he remembers his mother's last words. _To Tokyo. To Mugenjou._ To travel all by himself to the Kanto, to enter that vast, teeming city when he has never even left the compound before today. To Mugenjou, a place he has only heard the name of; whispered darkly amongst servants or a furtive mention in an adult conversation cut off quickly as his presence is noticed. What to do there, to go for what purpose save that his mother walked to her death with those words on her lips, he hasn't the slightest notion. And if Juubei doesn't want to, if he has to go alone… More aware now, another sound has intruded on his fractured hearing – low, steady breathing from across the room. Of course… Sakura. Is she asleep, or could she be lying wide-eyed in the dark, listening to the two of them? It doesn't matter, he realises. Because Juubei has someone _here_, someone _alive, _someone _family_… and he doesn't need to go to Tokyo.

"Don't… you don't have to come, Juubei." He has to force those words out, push them past the _don't leave me, don't leave _that wants to take their place. But however scared he is, however small and lost and alone, he can't force Juubei into anything he doesn't want to do. He can hardly hold Juubei to the ties between needle and thread now, when those ancient bonds lie in ashes and the two of them are all that is left. Juubei has every right to leave. To take his sister and go.

Juubei doesn't respond for a long instant, and Kadsuki feels his muscles tensing up all along his body, despite the shivering that has redoubled its hold upon him. Then Juubei's arms tighten on him again, and when the older boy speaks his voice is muffled in the heavy silk of Kadsuki's hair. "Want to come with you, Kadsuki. Wherever you need to go… don't leave me behind."

Neither of them speaks again that night. What more is there to say, after all? Whatever either of them might be thinking, whatever they might be needing, it's all there in their tightly clasped hands, in their bodies curled closely round one another as they wait for the dawn. But until it comes, Kadsuki takes comfort from the warmth pressed close against him: the friend who will stay by his side, come what may. 

_* * * * *_

_Ack, this one took a LONG time. Rewritten three times and I'm still not all that happy with it. But in between trying to get this chapter right… the next one is almost done by now, so hopefully it shouldn't be such a wait next time._

_Re Toshiki's background – all I have are the first couple of volumes of the KnK arc and a scan I found online of him in what looks like a bloodstained robe of some kind (and the quality's too fuzzy to read and find out what's happening) So forgive me for skirting that one **embarrassed look** but he's had enough angst up to now for him to be allowed to sit this one out, I think._


End file.
